ANOTHER great writer is lost to us. E.L. Konigsburg died on April 19, aged 83, from complications arising from a stroke.

She was the author of 21 books and won the Newbery Medal and a Newbery Honour for the very first two she published. They were perhaps her best known novels, From The Mixed-up Files Of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, and Jennifer, Hecate, Macbeth, William Mckinley, And Me, Elizabeth. And 30 years later, Konigsburg won the Newbery Medal again, for my personal favourite, The View From Saturday.

I have only read five of Konigsburg’s books – Mixed-Up Files, Saturday, The Second Mrs. Giaconda, A Proud Taste For Scarlet And Miniver, and, her last novel, The Mysterious Edge Of The Heroic World. I should really read more as I love and regularly re-read all but Mrs. Giaconda, which I don’t own.

Konigsburg once said that the children in her books want to be like everyone else, but at the same time different too. They are real kids, and they are like us all. Don’t we want to be special and yet accepted at the same time?

The Konigsburg children I know are ordinary kids with the usual fears and insecurities, but they are all also extraordinary people. Perhaps we are all extraordinary and simply need to be put in a novel for our gifts and special qualities to be noticed and recognised.

The View From Saturday is about four children who are chosen to form a team for an academic quiz. The story is told from the perspective of each of the children in turn, with Konigsburg looking closely into the lives, hearts and minds of each child, revealing more about individual characters as the story progresses by showing more about them, or, at times, the same details from different perspectives.

Like the other Konigsburg books I’ve read, Saturday is an easy and straightforward read in terms of language but a more complex one in terms of ideas and plot – Konigsburg’s characters are usually in the process of finding themselves, grappling with questions of identity, trying to make sense of the roles they play in the world. And they are always trying to make connections – with people and places, needing to belong, and longing to live lives with meaning and make memories worth recalling.

A Proud Taste For Scarlet And Miniver is not a coming-of-age story but about Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine. She was the wife of King Louis VII of France in the 12th century and, following the annulment of that marriage, she married King Henry II of England and bore him eight children, including two future English kings: Richard the Lionheart and John.

In Konigsburg’s book, Eleanor has been in heaven for eight centuries, awaiting the admission of her husband, Henry II. While Eleanor waits, she is joined by three people from her life: Abbot Suger, friend and counsellor to King Louis VII; her mother-in-law, the Empress Matilda; and the soldier and statesman William the Marshal, who served the kings Henry II, Richard the Lionheart, John, and Henry III. The abbot, the empress and the marshal take turns to narrate their stories and, in this way, life in the royal courts of 12th century France and England is presented, along with Eleanor’s role as the most important woman in both these worlds.

Konigsburg portrays the queen as an extraordinary and intelligent woman, full of grace, vitality, courage and imagination. Most of all, Eleanor is shown as a drily witty and headstrong woman who does not suffer fools.

Scarlet may sound like a book that would appeal more to adult readers, but it is written in a lovely, frank and friendly style, without the graphic violence or a great deal of the political intrigue one would find in a historical novel set in that period and written for adults. Kids who have to study that branch of history might find this book helpful.

There, Scarlet and Saturday are most definitely the Konigsburg books I like the best, but as there are 16 others (including three picture books and two short story collections) I have yet to read, perhaps I’ll find myself with new favourites before too long. Whatever the case may be, Konigsburg has given the world some truly special books that I hope will continue to remain in print for many years to come. If you haven’t already, do give this author’s work a try.

> Daphne Lee is a writer, editor, book reviewer and teacher. She runs a Facebook group, called The Places You Will Go, for lovers of all kinds of literature. Write to her at star2@thestar.com.my.

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